Seven stories here, some republished. Some are accomplished, such as the title story; some are stock items. The final story (A Man in a Million) is an incoherent ramble that appears to have destabilised the writer's judgement. It reads as an attempt at invective aimed at a new breed of Fleet Street / Soho writers. One ends by feeling sorry for John Wain because it is so embarrassing.
In the end it doesn't matter. I don't think anyone reads him anymore. The world of ploughman's lunches, Benson and Hedges, a bottle of "E" by the neck, Califont geysers and Ford Fiascos has slipped away. Twenty years ago our city library withdrew most of John Wain's fiction and I snapped it up at 50c per book. It's chastening to see how time and fashion change one's outlook.